For the second time in 600 years, the Serbs of Kosovo are trudging north towards Belgrade in defeat, taking their possessions and a bitter sense of humiliation to bequeath to future generations.

The rout of the Serb armies at the hands of the Ottomans on Blackbird Field in 1389 remains at the heart of the national mythology, powering an all-pervasive sense of victimhood and an innate antipathy to Islam.

This defeat could rankle even deeper and longer. This time, in Serb eyes, their fellow Christians sided with the Muslims and left them helpless. For two days two columns of Yugoslav army tanks and armoured cars, interspersed with private cars piled high with suitcases, have taken the main route north under the gaze of Nato troops.

Some soldiers waved three-finger Serb nationalist salutes in determined bravado, but they left behind an angry sense of hurt. Tens of thousands have already left, but no one knows how many of the province's estimated 200,000 Serbs might remain. Some are waiting with their bags packed for the dust to settle.

Not far from the ancient battleground at Blackbird Field, the latter-day Serb population of Kosovo Polje, a suburb of Pristina, was deciding whether to join the sad procession.

"We have not made up our minds," said a middle-aged customer chatting to the cashier in the Crystal grocers. He said he had fought the ethnic Albanian insurgents for the past year and, like most Serbs who remain in Kosovo, preferred not to give his name to a western journalist. "We always fight and win, and then we are always betrayed," the Serb veteran complained. "But we will fight back. You cannot defeat the Serbs."

A British armoured car rumbled past, rattling the shop windows, but he could not be bothered to turn round to watch it go by. Did he not trust the incoming Nato troops to protect Serbs from Kosovan retribution?

"Perhaps," he said. "They are just soldiers and men like we are. But it is not them that are making the decisions."

A nervous Serb family from the southern town of Prizren was not ready to entrust their lives to Nato impartiality. Nebojsa (who did not want his full name used) had pulled his communist-era Zastava off the road and had his head under the bonnet.

His wife said: "There are massacres going on even now by Albanian terrorists. How can we stay and wait [for Nato to take full charge] while our children might be killed without Serb soldiers there to protect them."

Unconfirmed stories of massacres by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) are predictably spreading like wildfire among a frightened minority. On Sunday night a British paratrooper shot dead a drunk Serb policeman who had been letting off his machine gun (in the air, local Serbs maintained). By yesterday the story of a British "massacre" of Serbs was doing the rounds.

Urus Vojunovic did not believe the rumours. He said he was only driving his mother, Mileva, north to Belgrade for a few days until the situation stabilised. Mr Vojunovic, from Kacanik, was convinced Serbs and Albanians could live together, seeing as "a big percentage of both sides are good people".

His mother nodded in agreement, but urged him to keep driving so as not to be left behind by the military escort.

Despite his firm belief that Serbs were about to face a genocidal onslaught, Ranko - a Serb mechanic in Pristina - said he and most of his fellow Orthodox Christians would remain in the provincial capital.

"If you look at history this has always been Serb land. We have a duty to stay here and protect it. All those who are leaving are traitors," he said.

The night before he had drunk coffee with British paratroopers, even though he believed them responsible for the Sunday night "massacre".

"They are just soldiers. This disaster has been brought upon us by politicians. Milosevic could have solved this in a day and no one would have died. Instead, so many people have been killed. For what gain? Nobody is staying here for Milosevic."

The defeat in 1389 had the bittersweet compensation of producing a tragic national icon, the hapless King Lazar, who fell in battle.